HESLET, Joseph C.

The Prescott Courier, Prescott Arizona Monday, April 8, 1935 Heslet’s Dream Ended by Death Joseph C. Heslet, who devoted more than 30 years of his time, talent, and money to the dream of striking oil in Chino Valley, is dead. A cancerous tumor of the bladder coupled with other complications, including a weak heart, caused his death in Mercy hospital Saturday morning. For those ailments, which had been growing more aggravated during the last year, he was admitted to the hospital during the middle of March for a couple of weeks. Then Mrs. Heslet came over from Palo Alto, California, rented an apartment and looked after him until early last week when the condition became so acute he was returned to the hospital. A mass was said for Mr. Heslet in Sacred Heart church this morning. Two other services are scheduled, one tonight at 7:30 o'clock in the Chapel of the Lester Ruffner Funeral Home by Yavapai counsel, # 1032, Knights of Columbus, and another in San Mateo, California, for which place Mrs. Heslet will leave with the body on the early morning train tomorrow. Burial will be in Holy Cross cemetery. It is the intention of Mrs. Heslet, who was in the employee of the Goldwater store 30 years ago and who now is an interior decorator, to carry on the work of her husband in an attempt to strike oil in Chino Valley. She estimated that $30,000 at least had been spent by Mr. Heslet and his associates in the last 30 years, trying to hit oil. Most of those associates now also are dead but the Corporation he created, The Anthony Oil company, will attempt to refinance and go ahead with a boar that was sunk 600 feet in 1917, only to be discontinued because of the war emergency and lack of funds. This was the second well Mr. Heslet had sunk. The first one attained a depth of 1960 feet but the driller, whom Mr. Heslet always said, never was an oil driller, failed to shut off the water. Moreover, he passed through 110 feet of oil sand without "shooting." Consequently, practically every dollar he could get hold of was spent in the quest of oil are making arrangements to that end. This much Mrs. Heslet today confided, not with any censure in her heart at all but as a plain statement of fact, she was prone to laugh off. He was a native of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, and May 11, 1858, was his birth date. He was just a boy, however, when his father fought a Southern plantation and removed his family to it. Joe Heslet was but five years old, however, when the civil war broke out. His father, a Unionist, took his whole family, including his mother (J. C.’s grandmother), to Ohio. There the father joined the Union forces and the boy, Joe, learned what it is to live more or less in an army camp. The grandmother had to cook for the soldiers. After the war the Heslet family went to Kansas where J. C. grew up on a cattle ranch and farm. In 1895 - 40 years ago - he came to Arizona from Colorado. He had been a fireman on the Denver and Rio Grande Western on the Sakuda – Pueblo run. Mr. Heslet’s first cousin, Senator W. A. Clark, copper magnete had offered him a position as fireman on the narrow gauge railroad at Jerome, but instead he went to work in the United Verde Copper company’s power house in Jerome. Later he was given a contract job of sampling matte, which returned very good money. In 1902 Mr. Heslet and a friend went on a vacation trip but it proved to be a prospecting trip. Along the Verde river Mr. Heslet noted outcroppings of oil shale, similar to that he had seen in Colorado oil fields. Oil ! Black Gold ! Chino Valley ! Those were his burning thoughts from then on. He hired a geologist to come over from California to make an examination of the shale. He told Mr. Heslet there is plenty of oil underneath. This same geologist, Mr. Heslet explained, is the one who predicted oil at Signal Hill, near Long Beach, California. Both Mr. and Mrs. Heslet were married twice. By his first wife, Mr. Heslet had a son, Elmer, residing in Los Angeles; Mrs. Heslet by her first husband also had a son, George K. Liddle, of New Mexico. Mr. Heslet also has a sister, Mrs. Bell, of Chicago. ------------------- The Arizona Republic, Phoenix Arizona Tuesday, April 9, 1935 Joseph Heslet Taken by Death You got, April 8 - Joseph C. Heslet, who devoted more than 30 years of his time, talent and money to the dream of the striking oil in Chino valley, died in mercy hospital Saturday morning. He was admitted to the hospital during the middle of March. Then Mrs. Heslet came from Palo Alto, California, and looked after him until early last week, when his condition became so acute he was returned to the hospital from her home here. Mrs. Heslet will leave with the body tomorrow for San Mateo, California. Burial will be in Holy Cross Cemetery there. It is the intention of Mrs. Heslet to carry on the work of her husband in an attempt to strike oil in Chino valley.